under a paper moon
by one hundred sleepless nights
Summary: For the sake of saving us. —Alicia/Chris. Summer '13 exchange fanfic, for new perspective.


for the summer '13 fanfic exchange

**dedication: **to new perspective  
**prompts: **lush bath bombs, a feeling of paranoia, upgrading to an iphone 5

**under a paper moon**

She is awake for all of the night, inhaling sour skittles one by one, savouring this acidic burn against her tongue. Alicia likes the way the tangy sweetness covers up the bitterness a the back of her mouth, the metallic flavour that always appears before the tears come.

She doesn't sleep because if she does, she'll dream, and if she dreams, she'll _remember_.

The bed is a little too empty and Alicia _despises_ the lack of warmth beside her. The air in the room is chilly, but she finds herself relishing in the coolness. It numbs her skin with shivers and chatters.

Alicia doesn't want to feel anything, anyways.

[x]

She's been dragged to the mall and Alicia watches, with blank eyes, as her friends coo enthusiastically over the newest products from Lush. She's exhausted, and it's all she can do not to seal her eyes and float away, but she fights it, because he'll be there to haunt her.

So instead, she wanders around the store aimlessly, softly inhaling the gorgeous fragrances emanating from the bath bombs.

They were always her favourite.

Humming softly, she twirls one in her hand with a barely there half-smile arching on her face. It's a breathtaking azure with miniscule flecks of glitter. The colour is curiously familiar, and Alicia can't figure out why.

Realization smashes into her like a runaway train and Alicia nearly keels over. Her fingers fumble clumsily with the (hiseyeshiseyeshiseyes) bath bomb, before the orb slips from her grasp and makes contact with the smooth floor with a satisfying crunch. The echo of it resounds in Alicia's ears, but she can only hear a intense buzzing and her friends hastily making excuses for her as she stumbles out of the store desperately, frantically.

_She hasn't been well that poor girl we'll pay for it sorry and thankyouverymuch._

Alicia finds herself in a brightly lit dollar store, fluorescent lamps lining the ceiling like tombstones in a cemetery. She curls up in front of a row of cheaply made glass vases. The pad of her thumb circles the screen of her iPhone 5, recently upgraded, and Alicia is tempted to call him.

There is an expanding hollowness inside of her as she checks her messages: concerned call-me-backs from friends and weary come-visits from family and questioning where-have-you-beens from classmates.

And nothing from him.

And Alicia can't breathe anymore; there is an overwhelming anguish flowing through her veins and lungs and airways, freezing and twisting until her eyesight is foggy.

She's tired. She's tired and angry and suffering so Alicia takes her phone and grinds the high-heels of her boots into the screen, hard. She stomps on it, over and over and over, because Alicia doesn't want to care anymore; it's simply too painful.

And when it's sufficiently mangled, unrecognizable on the floor, Alicia trails her dainty hand through the vases, weaving between various layers and designs. She tips one over recklessly, jostling it off the shelf.

Alicia watches, enthralled, as it somersaults through the air, and shatters into broken-heart sharp shards of herself.

It's oddly beautiful.

[x]

It's late, and Alicia doesn't want to find her way home. It's snowing, dots of powder white drifting down in a flurry. She can barely feel the frigid wind, although she only dons a thin cotton sweater and ribbed leggings. At the same time, she feels it far too much, seeping into her bones and ravenously sucking out her marrow, embedding itself into her heart and cracking it wide open.

Alicia misses him. She's drained from denial and pretending she's alright when she's not, and _fuck_, if it doesn't hurt, if it doesn't cut to the core.

So Alicia counts the snowflakes as they spiral down to escape, counts them as they sink into her dark cocoa hair and her coal black eyelashes. She counts them and loses count and starts all over again and laughs, almost.

"Alicia," there is a voice behind her, whisper soft and Alicia _knows _it. She knows that voice too well and there's an excruciating tapping inside her chest.

She ignores it, ignores it all, and laughs. It's been so long and she doesn't know if she can stop anymore, because she's sick and tired of feeling a tender ache within her _all the fucking time_.

And when she's finished, she pulls her crimson lower lip between her teeth, chews it till its raw and spits it out. "You're not real," she murmurs, rewinding the statement it to herself like a mantra. Alicia refuses to allow false hope to curl around her and squeeze, suffocating.

"Yes, I am," he snaps, forcefully, borderline playfully. His words are silky and smooth, baritone, like dark chocolate and Alicia finds her brittle defenses crumbling and collapsing. So she indulges in her alluring delusion, relishing the way she feels a semblance of normalcy, of happiness, again.

She doubts it'll last.

There is the strangest feeling of paranoia embracing her, like somebody's gazing at her, but no, that can't be, because he's not really there, is he? It's just a figment of Alicia's pathetic, desolate mind.

"Chris," she says, and feels a feather light exhale on the back of her neck, tickling her nerves and emotions and courage. She swirls around too swiftly, almost losing her balance, but his calloused hands rest on her waist, steadying her. He's there and he's real and it's all Alicia can do not to pinch herself in shock.

He doesn't move, for a minute, and neither does she. Alicia stares at him, her frozen cheeks shoved upwards in a disbelieving smile; his mouth is set in a boyish, crooked grin and his tousled coffee hair is littered with sparkling flecks of white and his eyes—his eyes, they're the same blend of exquisite blue that she was never really able to forget, pressed and preserved deep within the confines of her head.

"Chris," Alicia mumbles, again, and he moves forwards like shadows. He presses kisses to her throat, her temples, her lips, with gasps of _I'msorryi'msorryi'msorry_ and _iloveyouiloveyouiloveyou_ and Alicia swears she sees stars burst beneath her eyelids, in that very moment.

Alicia breathes to the rhythm of his metronome heart, and under the luminous moon glinting delicately and stars sewn into a canvas of sky, he finds her, like he always does.

* * *

okay. so. i hope you like it! it doesn't really make much sense, but i literally wrote it at 3 am and yea.

and happy belated canada day to my fellow canadians out there!

so. review? :)


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